[Click eStock] "Yuhan Yanghang, Time to Focus on Clinical Momentum... Target Price Downgraded"

Meritz Securities has lowered the target stock price from 220,000 KRW to 200,000 KRW following Yuhan Corporation's technology return from the German pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim.

According to industry sources on the 10th, Yuhan Corporation recently received notification from Boehringer Ingelheim regarding the discontinuation of development and return of rights for the treatment of metabolic disorder-related nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (MASH) and related liver diseases.

In 2019, Yuhan Corporation licensed out the technology for 'BI 3006337,' a dual-action antibody targeting glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21), hormones produced in the intestines, to Boehringer Ingelheim.

Regarding this, Junyoung Kim, a researcher at Meritz Securities, stated, "The reason for the technology return appears to be a strategic decision rather than an issue with the drug," adding, "Since the combination of GLP-1 and FGF21 has shown benefits, there remains potential for additional technology transfers in the future."

Researcher Kim explained, "We are lowering the fair stock price to 200,000 KRW due to the exclusion of the new drug value of BI3006337, which was returned from Boehringer Ingelheim, amounting to 536.4 billion KRW, and adjustments to the peer group multiples."

Researcher Kim analyzed that it is time to focus on upcoming clinical momentum rather than the technology return. Yuhan Corporation is scheduled to disclose the final overall survival (OS) results of the Phase 3 clinical trial (MARIPOSA) for Lekraza Librevent at the European Lung Cancer Conference 2025, held from the 26th to the 29th.

Researcher Kim predicted, "If the final OS results show an improvement of more than 12 months, it is expected that approval of the SC formulation will strengthen the company's position to secure market share."